Letter: Young people betrayed over education fees

Friday 15th April 2011, 6:00AM BST.

Letter: At a time of austerity the students of this country are being asked to find up to £9,000 per year university tuition fees. The Government has now announced that British taxpayers shall pay £650 million to assist in Pakistani education.

I feel this is yet another betrayal of young people.

B Pascall

Muxton

1
zz94

April 15, 2011 at 10:23

Its called pay back. If imperialist Britain hadn’t pillaged the planet one hundred and fifty years ago then we wouldn’t be in this mess.
Thank your lucky stars the Chinese have not reminded you that Britain swamped their nation with heroin and destroyed their economy. If they do then it will cost far more than £650m.

Report abuse
2
The Original Jake

April 15, 2011 at 10:28

They’re not being asked to find anything of the sort.

Read this: http://www.factsonfees.com/

Report abuse
3
Chris

April 15, 2011 at 10:51

It’s about time we look after number one for a change, would Pakistan fund our education if it was on the other foot, I think not!

Report abuse
4
ANDREW FINCH

April 15, 2011 at 11:30

As with Jake’s commnet on this letter it is not true at all couldn’t be further from the truth .
May I ask why should they get further education for free????????.
I agree on the foreign aid issues they are valid issues and need to be dealt with we are not talking about who in the uk gets the tax payers money but we are being told why successive governments year in year out who we dish the British tax payers money too and that is wrong.

Report abuse
5
eva land

April 15, 2011 at 11:43

If this is an attempt to prevent further religious fundamentalism by improving education in Pakistan then it will not work.

This kind of rigid view of the world happened in Germany with Nazism,in the US with the Klu Klux Klan and Russia with Communism and education doesn’t really make a difference it’s all about territory, elitism and power at the end of the day.

Report abuse
6
Colin.D.

April 15, 2011 at 12:06

This beggars belief. Surely the money would be better spent on OUR education system.
The lunatics are indeed running the asylum.

Report abuse
7
Peter

April 15, 2011 at 12:19

An ignorant, racist sulk of a letter I’m afraid, and incorrect in so many ways.

Firstly – no-one is expected to find these fees up front – they are paid back on a sliding scale dependent upon income, and in some cases will never be paid back.

Secondly – foreign aid is given for a variety of complex diplomatic reasons, and principally to exert our influence abroad.

£650 million sounds like a lot, but it’s peanuts compared to the up to £120 billion per annum we allow to go unpaid in tax by allowing large companies and wealthy individuals to move profits made on the backs of UK workers abroad. Why is B. Pascall not complaining about that? Probably because it’s easier to blame foreigners!

Presumably the letter writer would prefer that young people in Pakistan were ‘educated’ by the Taliban? Or didn’t he/she think about the consequences of that?

Report abuse
- ANDREW FINCH
  
  April 16, 2011 at 15:15
  
  Peter you do have a bee in your bonnet with regards the wealthy eluding tax get over it always has been and always will be.
  £650 MILLION true not a lot in the big scheme of things, however it is British tax payers money and we should be asked when it comes to dishing our money out abroad if the majority of the UK is in agreement. Do we want to gain influence in some of these countries? Pakistan in particular . I agree it is also foe other particular complex diplomatic reasons again why are we involved with these countries why are we in Libya places such as these will never change unless the people of that country chooses to change it. Lets see when the Libyan regime is gone we may not like what take its place my opinion fundamentalist are waiting for the chance to come to power and they will as sure as the sun rises in the morning we as a country are just giving them a helping hand via the UN.
  
  Report abuse
  - Peter
    
    April 19, 2011 at 16:01
    
    Andrew,
    
    Too right I have a bee in my bonnet about the extent to which we subsidise the rich by giving them tax breaks that are not open to the rest of us.
    
    Why are you so subservient? Do you actually tug your forelock when you meet someone really wealthy?
    
    The average senior exec salary in the UK in the mid-1990s was approx. 44 times that of their lowest paid worker. By the middle of the last decade that has risen to 88 times. Surely you can see that this is an unsustainable rise?
    
    I’m not suggesting that we should pay a doctor the same as a dustman or a senior executive the same as a street sweeper – but there have to be some limits to this excessive greed, especially at a time when the rest of us are expected to pay the price for the greed and risk-taking of the banks.
    
    The mechanism we have at our disposal to ensure that this huge imbalance is addressed is the tax system – we need to close these loopholes and force business to pay its taxes in the country where its workers make its profits, rather than alllowing that money to be sent to tax-havens elsewhere.
    
    We are about to lose hundreds of thousands of public-sector jobs, and a similar number of private-sector ones as a result of the deep ideologically-driven cuts we are facing. Do you not think that many of those jobs when revived as part of the private sector ‘replacement’ for such services will be done from offshore locations too?
    
    We need to stop large companies from asset-stripping the UK of both its jobs and the taxes due on the profits made here. If we keep allowing the rich such unbridled greed we’ll find ourselves with nothing left but a ‘sweatshop’ economy.
    
    Report abuse
- zz94
  
  April 16, 2011 at 17:19
  
  You should all listen to Peter. We import three times more than we export, these are not handouts, they are trade and industry contracts.
  England is far from self sufficient. If you insist on believing UKIP and the BNP and build a wall around England then the developing nations with their vast human resources and mineral wealth will wipe England off the globe at an economical level within an instant. The banks are already thinking of moving east. Darwin and Huxley were far more than philosophers!
  
  Report abuse
  - Nistagmus
    
    April 18, 2011 at 18:19
    
    Not true. Isolationism works! China flourished following an isolationist agenda for hundreds of years something it is enjoying to this day….hang on, just checked my facts, China went completely down the pan following an isolationist agenda for hundreds of years and only climbed it’s way out recently when it accepted that it needed the rest of the world and now the UK banks are going to move their Head Offices over there. Isolationism is a crock!
    
    Report abuse
  - Ken Adams
    
    April 26, 2011 at 12:54
    
    UKIP are not isolationists! there is nothing isolationist about wanting Britain to be governed by and for the British.
    
    And why is it being isolationist to educate your own people before donating our tax money to a foreign county.
    
    Report abuse
8
ANDREW FINCH

April 26, 2011 at 11:57

Peter you ask
“Why are you so subservient? Do you actually tug your forelock when you meet someone really wealthy?

No not at all Peter, I am just not a hypocrite, sorry but If I were a wealthy man I would do exactly the same . As for the amount of public sector jobs to go with respect we can do with out half of the ps workers anyway and save that money wages/pension/etc .
You mention the sweat shop of Europe possibly , However the vast majority of the public think nothing of buying clothes etc from third world sweatshops via the stores, only a matter of time and they can feel how it is to work in such a place to provide them with cheap clothing etc

Report abuse